However...didn't you just change the question? I can understand how your solution would answer the question 'X is what percent of Y?'. But the question actually says 'What percent is X of Y?'. Aren't these two questions fundamentally different? Or is there something I'm missing?

However...didn't you just change the question? I can understand how your solution would answer the question 'X is what percent of Y?'. But the question actually says 'What percent is X of Y?'. Aren't these two questions fundamentally different? Or is there something I'm missing?

hmm, yeah, this problem has sloppy writing.

it should be written in one of the following 2 ways:"what percent of y is x?"or"x is what percent of y?"

i'll submit this problem for revision.

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by the way:are you a non-native speaker of english?just wondering - my instinct is that native speakers of english would process this question in the intended way without hesitation, while non-native speakers (who would rely on literal rules such as "of means multiplication") would be more likely to have trouble with it.either way, it's essentially our fault, since it's not terribly well written. thanks for bringing it to our attention.

I'm actually a native speaker (born and raised in Australia). If its any consolation, I'm a musician, so it could just be a non-native/musician problem. Regardless, I've discovered that I make fewer mistakes when I follow the literal rules, so I've made it a point to always convert the problem into an equation. It had worked for me 100% of the time...up until now.

in any case there are two things you need to determine to answer the question1) the "part" 2) and the "whole"

in a statement like x of Y, you usually consider the "of Y" as the whole. So this question is really simple. Figure out the whole and the part . If you do that should end up with an expression x/y or y/x ....in any case you will notice statement 2 does not help you find either but statement one does

in any case there are two things you need to determine to answer the question1) the "part" 2) and the "whole"

in a statement like x of Y, you usually consider the "of Y" as the whole. So this question is really simple. Figure out the whole and the part . If you do that should end up with an expression x/y or y/x ....in any case you will notice statement 2 does not help you find either but statement one does

Right...and basically what I've been trying to understand is whether it is appropriate to assume (as you have done) that "of" means "divided by". If we cannot assume this, then I don't see how the answer can be determined, even with both of the statements taken together.

where is the consistency? two same expressions "of 10 " and "is 6" just reversed in a sentence in your case warranted a different mathimatical operation in each case

If I am forced to make an assumption then I will say specifically with fractions "of" signals a whole(notice i didn't say division) and "is" signals a part. just like in sentence correction "some(x) of the the men(y) are good" means x is a fraction of y( of the men ).

It basically comes down to how we interpret the usage of 'of' in this context. I'd never heard/seen this type of usage before, hence the query. I actually thought it was a trick question rather than a simple one.

Now, in no way am I advocating that the word 'of' always means 'times'. If I had added the word 'out' to the question I would have interpreted it differently:

What percent is x out of y?

In this case, I'm happy to concede that the question translates to z/100 = x/y, because I recognise that 'out of' means 'divided by'. Take for example the following phrase:

'5 out of 10 people drink milk every day'.

We wouldn't say '5 of 10 people drink milk every day'. Having said that, I doubt a question would use the words 'out of' in the first place. The question would most likely just use '/' symbol or express 'x/y' as a fraction using a graphic.

Either way, Ron admitted that this question was poorly worded, so I'm happy to leave it at that.

I understand that statement one is true if X or Y are both non-zero integers, but what if X is Zero? Should I not think about if a number can be Zero on the exam? What would If X=0 thne Y=0, All that tells me is that Y and X are =